Quiet Intimacy

Quiet Intimacy

I have a confession to make: this is my favourite Karen Jones picture, so it will be a struggle to remain objective. Like most great works of art, the intention of the creator of this picture remain mysterious; it seems to me to be the first of series that might be called, without pretension, rhapsodies. The musical term is deliberate; in pushing out to the boundaries of her delirious mixture of pop culture references, fine art sensibility and clash between western spiritual and moral values versus a growing, zen-like comprehension of the universe, she seems to have rendered in the visual, the aural; this is like great music to me. There are two versions of this picture; one is in shades of green, and I didn’t think it could be improved upon, but then, on looking at this I think that this one is an improvement. It is a magical, stirring, sensuous yet frightening, fantastic landscape whose lush and delicate tones, wisps and puffs of oxygen and divine light almost recall the arcadias of Nicholas Poussin himself.